Metro: Shake-Up or Shakedown?

Oregon voters had a chance in the May primary to shake up the Metro regional government. Five of the seven council seats were up for election. Rather than a vote for change, it looks like we are in for a few more years of the same old, same old. I hope not.

Three incumbents were reelected by wide margins, a radical car-hater ran unopposed, and even Metro Council President Lynn Peterson was reelected.

That’s a shame because Metro needs a shake-up to stop its shakedown of the region’s residents, businesses and taxpayers.

Metro was originally envisioned as a “good government” project. And, like all “good government” projects, some succeed, many fail, and some go off the rails. Metro has gone off the rails. It began as an idea to fight sprawl by coordinating land use and transportation around the region. It was meant to be a tiny, sleepy agency that would only interest someone with a planning degree.

But over time, the agency founded to fight sprawl grew into a sprawling Leviathan itself with nearly 1,100 employees. First, it took over the Oregon Zoo from the City of Portland. Then, Metro became the owner of the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, the Keller Auditorium, and the Portland’5 Centers for the Arts, serving as the landlord to dozens of arts groups. In 1990, it opened the Oregon Convention Center. Later, Multnomah County turned over the county parks, as well as the Portland Expo Center, historic cemeteries and Glendoveer golf facilities. In 2018, it got into the affordable housing construction business. The next year, Metro entered the hotel business with the opening of the convention center hotel. Last year, it entered the homeless services business – a cash spigot they couldn't resist.

Rather than streamlining local government, Metro added another layer of government, red tape and overhead. It’s not enough that the State of Oregon and the City of Portland are trying to impose freeway tolling and congestion pricing, Metro has jumped into the congestion pricing gig as well. Someday, a drive from Beaverton to the airport may involve paying tolls to three different agencies. In addition to the counties and cities addressing homelessness, Metro has now inserted itself and its bloated bureaucracy. Metro’s own auditor has warned that more than one-third of the money collected will go toward collections, overhead and administrative costs.

Metro gets about a third of its revenues from the enterprises it runs: the convention center, the expo center, the zoo, the arts venues and solid waste. Over the past four fiscal years, these enterprises have lost more than $60 million. Even pre-pandemic, the business side of Metro had been losing money. In the past 10 years, Metro’s spending has nearly quadrupled to more than $1 billion a year. Its outstanding debt has nearly tripled to a little less than $1 billion.

This explains, in part, why Metro has an unending appetite for more taxpayer money. Since 2018, Metro has imposed more than $3 billion in tax increases for affordable housing, parks and nature, and homeless services. These ballot measures increased property taxes and imposed two new region-wide income taxes.

But, it seems the more Metro does and the more Metro spends, the worse things get. Traffic jams are longer and more frequent. Housing is becoming less affordable. Homelessness is spreading. They’re taking away the things Portlanders love. The zoo train is a shadow of its former self; what was once a 30-minute loop through Washington Park has been chopped down to a six-minute jaunt that costs $5 per person. Zoo concerts? Gone for the next five years or more, according to the latest budget.

Maybe the incoming Metro Council will take a step back and look at what Metro has become. We can hope that our new councilors agree that Metro needs shaking up.

Metro currently taxes your home and your garbage. It wants to tax every dollar you earn and every mile you drive. In addition to the $3 billion in tax increases already imposed since 2018, Metro is teeing up a “renewal” of its property tax increase for parks and nature. I hope a majority of the council agree that taxpayers are tapped out and enough is enough. If they can “pause” zoo concerts for the next five years, maybe they should pause tax increases for the next five years.

ODOT wants to toll I-5, I-205 and the bridges crossing the Columbia River. The City of Portland wants to toll city streets. On top of that, Metro is pursuing region-wide road tolling.

What began as a common sense approach to reduce congestion has morphed into a money grab. Metro has been clear that it does not want to use any of the tolling money to improve roads and highways. Instead, it wants to spend the money on mass transit, pedestrian and bicycle improvements, and “equitable mobility.”

If Metro gets its way, we will be paying more to drive, but getting less. Gubernatorial candidate Betsy Johnson put it best: “Charging me again for the roads we built with my tax money and then telling me when I can drive on them? How about hell no. I do not like tolling, I do not like it here or there, I do not find tolling fair, I won’t support it anywhere.” Please, someone on Metro Council, channel your inner Betsy and just say “no” to tolling.

TriMet ridership peaked a decade ago. For the past 10 years, ridership has been steadily decreasing. With COVID-19, ridership plummeted and is not expected to return to pre-pandemic levels until sometime after 2045 (that’s not a typo).

For years, TriMet has failed to get voter approval for light rail. It hopes to use Metro as its fundraising arm. More than half the money in 2020’s rejected transportation measure was earmarked for an unneeded and unwanted light rail project from PSU to the upscale Bridgeport Village shopping center. Metro needs to recognize that MAX is a failure and tell TriMet that it’s on its own to find local funding for its light rail dreams.

There is one light rail project the region adores: the zoo train. But, it seems to be the only light rail project that Metro hates. A few years ago, mudslides took out a portion of the track. Since then, the zoo train has run on a short loop and no longer connects with Washington Park.

It’s estimated that it would have cost $3 to 4 million to restore the full zoo train loop. But, Metro President Lynn Peterson has said the service will never be restored. It’s not because of money; it’s because Metro and the City of Portland want to turn the loop into a hiking/biking trail. Metro Council candidates, if you want to be a hero to the region’s families, bring back the zoo train.

Last year, Metro’s two new income taxes went into effect. The money is supposed to pay for “supportive housing services.” Put simply, voters were lied to. The measure was pitched as a way to reduce homelessness in the region. Instead, much of the money is earmarked for rental vouchers for people who already have housing. More than a year into the program, neither Metro or its county partners have developed any plans to reduce the number of unsheltered homeless with the money. Moreover, they have not established any way to measure the success or failure of their efforts.

Ideally, the two income taxes should be repealed and the entire program shut down. But, if Metro Council doesn’t have the stomach for that, then the money should be redeployed to increase the amount of shelter space throughout the region.

Metro Council needs to get serious about what to do with the Portland Expo Center. The facility needs subsidies from Metro, the City of Portland and Multnomah County just to cover its operating costs. It needs a massive capital investment but can’t generate the revenue to justify it. At this point, it’s just a money pit. Metro’s chief financial officer, Brian Kennedy, recently told the Portland Business Journal, “for eight of the prior 10 years, Expo had a net operating loss in their budget.” Even pre-pandemic the Expo Center has been losing money.

Metro should cut their losses and sell off the Expo Center. They can give it away, and Metro would be better off financially. In the meantime, they should use their gusher of Supportive Housing Services money to convert the Expo Center into a shelter for the region’s homeless.

New faces on Metro Council should bring new ideas to our sprawling regional government. The same old, same old isn’t working and many of the region’s voters and taxpayers have had enough of paying more while getting less. It’s time to shake-up Metro.